The present disclosure relates to a puncture assisting device and a puncture device set which can be used for subcutaneous injection of a drug.
In the related art, when a drug (drug solution) is subcutaneously injected, a puncture device is used that includes a needle for puncturing the skin so as to intracutaneously or subcutaneously inject the drug through the needle (for example, refer to JP-A-2008-295590).
When the drug is subcutaneously injected by using this puncture device, as an injection site, an upper arm, an abdomen, a thigh, a hip, and the like are mainly selected, since their regions are wide and are located at an easily visible position. The reason is that the drug is easily administered thereto and the skin is likely to be pinched when the needle of the puncture device punctures the skin.
However, in most of these sites, the skin cannot stretch so much. In general, it is known that the upper limit of a drug amount which can be administered is 1 ml. In addition, even if the drug amount to be administered is limited, the administered drug invasively pressurizes a free end of a subcutaneous nerve or causes severe pain due to features of the drug (pH or a surfactant). The subcutaneous injection is basically carried out without anesthesia. In addition, in many cases, the drug has to be continuously injected multiple times. Accordingly, pain relief during the injection has been required.
Therefore, a method has been proposed in which the subcutaneous injection is carried out through the skin of an elbow joint stretching portion at an elbow instead of the above-described sites. The skin of the elbow joint stretching portion at the elbow is more likely to stretch than the skin of other sites, and does not have anatomically major nerves or blood vessels which are present therein. Therefore, a large amount of the drug can be subcutaneously injected without causing pain, compared to other sites.